The temporal dynamics of directed reappraisal in high-trait-anxious individuals

High-trait-anxious (HTA) individuals often experience high levels of negative emotions, signaling potential abnormalities in the down-regulation of negative emotions. In this study, we used event-related potentials to examine whether HTA individuals can effectively use directed reappraisal to down-regulate negative emotions. Participants completed a passive picture-viewing task in which pictures were preceded by audio descriptions of their content. For unpleasant pictures, descriptions were either neutral or negative, whereas for neutral pictures, only neutral descriptions were given. Self-report behavioral results indicated that HTA individuals reported greater unpleasantness for the pictures than did low-trait-anxious (LTA) individuals but revealed no abnormality in decreasing negative emotional experience. Such abnormality, however, did emerge neurally. Analyses focused on the central-parietal late positive potential (LPP), a neural marker of emotion regulation. LTA individuals showed an LPP reduction in response to unpleasant pictures with negative descriptions compared to neutral ones at 400-3000-ms post-picture-onset, indicating effective down-regulation of negative emotions. HTA individuals, however, showed no LPP reduction at 400- to 1,000-ms post picture onset. Instead, they showed an LPP increase in response to unpleasant pictures with negative descriptions compared to neutral ones at 1,000- to 2,000-ms post picture-onset. These abnormal central-parietal LPP patterns not only verify that HTA individuals exhibit ineffective use of directed reappraisal to down-regulate neural responses to unpleasant stimuli, but also reveal an abnormal time-course of directed reappraisal in such individuals. Our findings also suggest that the ineffective use of cognitive reappraisals may contribute to the generally elevated levels of negative emotionality in HTA individuals. (PsycINFO Database Record